Jason Vaughn's Lied Library theme article analysis

In this theme article, “Lied Library @ four years: technology never stands still”, Mr. Vaughan chronicles the soup-to-nuts journey of a new library to its established reputation. Written in 2004, his article achieves its goal of relating the challenges faced from inception to reality. I agree that this would be a very useful case study for a new library.

Mr. Vaughan does not omit any detail, from the per-page printing charge remaining static to the issue of air-conditioning in the server room. His descriptions were often clever, i.e., referring to the library’s software images as being everything but “plain vanilla” or simple. The writing was fluid, albeit descriptively heavy at times, and the timeline was documented with knowledge and pride.

Mr. Vaughan addressed an important point towards the end of the article. He speaks of the challenges faced in order to keep up with the maintenance of aging equipment and systems. The challenge of finding ways to fund long-term plans for upgrading software, hardware, etc., is not unique to libraries. It would have been a good argument to place in the article at that juncture.

As Mr. Vaughan’s article was clear and easy to absorb, I look forward to reading more about UNLV’s Lied Library and its plans to collaborate digitally with other institutions and integrate a content management system.